Thoughts for May 20 from Fr Willie Doyle

I did not write because I had nothing but disappointment, opposition, cold shower-baths and crosses to chronicle…Your news about the success in England is glorious, and yet I am assured that mine will come in Dublin if ever a house is opened. … I am confident the real difficulty will be to keep the men out. I never realised till I got on the mission staff the immense amount of faith and love for holy things there is everywhere still in Ireland. … It has been a four years’ Calvary, but yesterday the Resurrection, I hope, began, for I heard that Rathfarnham Castle with 53 acres has been purchased at last, and I have the Provincial’s promise (when that took place) to allow me to make a start in the stables. Ye Gods ! Fancy the mighty Doyle preaching in a stable! Very like the Master is it not ?’

COMMENT: Fr Doyle wrote these words 104 years ago today, on May 20 1913, in a letter to Fr Charles Plater SJ. Fr Plater had founded a retreat house for working men, and Fr Doyle was a supporter of this initiative, and expended much energy in his attempts to establish a similar house for workers in Ireland. He traveled around Europe researching the idea and wrote a booklet on the issue. Fr Doyle saw such retreats as an essential outreach to lay people and to ordinary workers in general at a time when worker’s rights were a burning issue of the day – the Dublin Lockout also occurred in late 1913, and the rights of labour were central to the political and philosophical debates of the day.

Fr Doyle did not live to see his cherished workers retreat, but eventually a house for this purpose was built in Rathfarnham after Fr Doyle’s death. It evolved into the Lay Retreat Association which continued in operation until it sadly closed down last year.

Fr Willie Doyle SJ

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Prayer (For Private Use Only)

O Jesus, who has given us the example of Your servant, Father William Doyle, graciously grant us the favours we ask You through his intercession...[Make petition.]

Teach us to imitate his love for You, his heroic devotion to Your service, his zeal for repairing the outrages done to Your glory and for the salvation of souls. Hear our prayer and show us the credit he now enjoys in heaven so that we may soon be able to venerate him in public worship."

Our Father, Hail Mary, Glory Be

About this blog

This blog seeks to share some daily reflections from the writings of the heroic Jesuit "martyr" Fr Willie Doyle. My hope is that more people can come to know, and learn from, this remarkable man.

A more complete explanation of this blog can be found by clicking on Why This Blog? at the top of the page.

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Prayer for Priests by Fr Doyle

O my God, pour out in abundance Thy spirit of sacrifice upon Thy priests. It is both their glory and their duty to become victims, to be burnt up for souls, to live without ordinary joys, to be often the objects of distrust, injustice, and persecution.

The words they say every day at the altar, "This is my Body, this is my Blood," grant them to apply to themselves: "I am no longer myself, I am Jesus, Jesus crucified. I am, like the bread and wine, a substance no longer itself, but by consecration another."

O my God, I burn with desire for the sanctification of Thy priests. I wish all the priestly hands which touch Thee were hands whose touch is gentle and pleasing to Thee, that all the mouths uttering such sublime words at the altar should never descend to speaking trivialities.

Let priests in all their person stay at the level of their lofty functions, let every man find them simple and great, like the Holy Eucharist, accessible to all yet above the rest of men. O my God, grant them to carry with them from the Mass of today, a thirst for the Mass of tomorrow, and grant them, ladened themselves with gifts, to share these abundantly with their fellow men. Amen.

Declaration

In obedience to the decree of Pope Urban VIII, all
that all that is written on this site about Fr. Doyle has no other force or credit than such as is grounded on human authority. Hence no expression or statement is intended to assume the approbation or anticipate the decision of the Church.